Edward Sharpham (baptised 1576 – 1608) was an English playwright and pamphleteer.

Life

He was baptised on 22 July 1576, the third son of Richard Sharpham of Colehanger, a manor in the parish of East Allington. His father having died when Sharpham was five his mother married Alexander Hext, with whom she had three children. Having been widowed a second time in 1588, she subsequently married Charles Barnaby of

Clement's Inn The Inns of Chancery or ''Hospida Cancellarie'' were a group of buildings and legal institutions in London initially attached to the Inns of Court and used as offices for the clerks of chancery, from which they drew their name. Existing from a ...

. Sharpham probably attended grammar school in Devon, possibly William Kemp's school in Plymouth. He was admitted to the

Middle Temple The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn ...

on 9 October 1594. In 1592 Sharpham's mother began a lawsuit against a Thomas Fortescue, alleging he had murdered her first husband by poison and also used witchcraft to make her fall in love with him. Four years later Sharpham himself also sued Fortescue and another man, William Bastard, on a charge of having tampered with evidence relating to his mother's suit. He remained associated with the Middle Temple. On 22 April 1608, aged 31, Sharpham made his will. He died the next day, and was buried in

St. Margaret's, Westminster The Church of St Margaret, Westminster Abbey, is in the grounds of Westminster Abbey on Parliament Square, London, England. It is dedicated to Margaret of Antioch, and forms part of a single World Heritage Site with the Palace of Westminster ...

Works

Sharpham is believed to have been the 'E.S.' who in 1597 wrote ''The Discoverie of the Knights of the Poste'', a pamphlet of the "conycatching" genre detailing the tricks of conmen active on the road between London and Exeter. He may also be the 'E.S.' who contributed a commendatory poem to the publication of

Ben Jonson Benjamin "Ben" Jonson (c. 11 June 1572 – c. 16 August 1637) was an English playwright and poet. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence upon English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for t ...

's ''Volpone'' (1607), although Jonson later described Sharpham as a "rogue". His first known play, ''The Fleire'', was written for one of the popular boys' theatre companies, the Children of the Blackfriars. Composition date is some time between late 1605 and the play's appearance in the Stationers Register on 13 May 1606. Cynical in tone, ''The Fleire'' is a court-oriented satire similar to Marston's ''The Malcontent'' and ''The Fawne''. The play's popularity, at least as text, is shown by its being reprinted three times. ''

Cupid's Whirligig ''Cupid's Whirligig'', by Edward Sharpham (1576-1608), is a city comedy set in London about a husband that suspects his wife of having affairs with other men and is consumed with irrational jealousy. It was first published in quarto in 1607, en ...

'' was Sharpham's second and last play, produced early in 1607 and printed later the same year with a dedication to fellow Devonian and author

Robert Hayman Robert Hayman (14 August 1575 – November 1629) was a poet, colonist and Proprietary Governor of Bristol's Hope colony in Newfoundland. Early life and education Hayman was born in Wolborough near Newton Abbot, Devon, the eldest of nine ch ...

. Again, it satirises court life in a general way, though it has been speculated that the character Nucome, carefully described as 'Welsh', may actually be a veiled attack on the king's Scottish favourite

Robert Carr Leonard Robert Carr, Baron Carr of Hadley, (11 November 1916 – 17 February 2012) was a British Conservative Party politician who served as Home Secretary from 1972 to 1974. He served as a Member of Parliament (MP) for 26 years, and later se ...

. This play too was eventually reprinted three times.

Notes

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Sharpham, Edward 1608 deaths English dramatists and playwrights